TV Show King Party - Wii Review

TV Show King was one of my favourite WiiWare titles out of the selection of early games. It had some simple laughs, a "fun" style and a multiplayer mode that was brilliant for when I had friends over, which is why I was one of the few that was actually excited when a retail sequel was announced (despite the fact that it was placed in the Play Zone series, which also consists of Babysitting Party).

The basic gameplay is the same as the original - you answer seven multiple-choice questions, then get a chance to spin the wheel, resulting in either a win or loss of your current cash total. After three, six, or nine rounds (playable on either easy, genius or "king" difficulties), the top two players of the four go head to head, as you see who can get five correct answers first. It's all fairly simple, but it works really well. Every round, there's a "special event", where each correct answer for the subsequent question will receive an extra load of cash, and there's also a tactical element to the whole game as well, since you can also see what all the other players have chosen as well, giving you the chance to copy them and change your current answer (although slower answers do win lesser amounts of money), or even bluff, changing your answer at the very last second.

It's all very fun, and hardly an element of it has been altered from the original. The really dumb answers are still floating around, and you still get host Jerry's nice little memorable inputs every now and then. The wheel has also been left unchanged, there are still the "fun" flash light and scratch card rounds and you still get fifteen seconds to answer a question (although the timer speeds up when everyone has selected an answer). There is one new feature added to the "classic" mode though, which gives the losing player the chance to select a category every other round. These categories are the same ones used in normal play, and range from sport, to science and environment and entertainment. These questions are often easier than you may first think though, with a large amount of the questions being tailored to the region you are playing in (for example, we got asked which of the options was a BBC Radio 1 DJ in one instance, as well as receiving several questions about songs that reached number one - including Bob The Builder's hit Can We Fix It?; It's all here).

There is the same single player mode from the original included as well. "Quiz Attack" is the mode that throws one question after another at you, until you get one of them wrong and lose the game. As with the original though, the game is still lacking in single player, and could definitely do with something exciting for those gamers out there who are friend-less.

For those that do have friends though, there is a brand new mode included this time. "Last One Standing" is a game similar to quiz attack, but in this case you are up against your friends. If one of you gets a question wrong, a crane appears and lifts you out of the game. As the title suggests, the player that is left standing at the end is crowned champion, however this mode is only for when you've got more than one remote handy, since it does not use CPU characters.

In addition to the above modes, there are another couple that I should mention. First of all, there is the opportunity to go head to head in teams, rather than as four separate players. The game play is the same, but with a combined score, and everything has still been left in (including, oddly, the final duel). This mode is, however, flawed, since there is no opportunity to choose which team you go on, or give handicaps to the lesser able teams, and you are instead placed into a team depending on your Wii remote number (meaning that if there are just two of you, you'll always end up together).

There is also one final mode, which consists of "The Final Duel" from classic mode, and although it is a nice two-player touch for those who haven't got time to go through a whole quiz, it feels just a tad pointless, since no effort has been made to distinguish it from its original state.

It's not just the extra modes that have been given a revamping though, and you'll find that almost everything from the menus to the "set" design have been tweaked here and there, with updated animation sequences, (which can jitter slightly during transition) quotes from Jerry, and animated menu icons also improving the experience here over the original. There is also the removal of Mii's in this game, as you'll find yourself playing against more detailed avatars instead, which are chosen randomly before play. As if all this weren't enough, even choosing a Mii for yourself is easier now, with a bigger scrolling icon at the side of the menu. This doesn't completely solve the problems we had with the original, since we'd still rather use the D-pad for scrolling through characters, but it certainly improves our previous issues.

Another addition worth mentioning is the record table. Previously, it contained the top ten scorers in classic mode (keeping a running total of all your cash) and the top ten in quiz attack. This time, the tables are more detailed, and you can view who's the best at each of the modes, with the option to also view by difficulty and number of rounds. This certainly makes the tables a lot clearer and easier to read, and is a welcome addition in our opinion.

Otherwise, the experience feels just the same as the original. The backgrounds are the same, the music is the same, even the Wii Menu screen is the same, but those who never experienced the original (or those who really enjoyed it) should look no further than this remake, which more than ticks the boxes for a recommendable update (even if you don't like the new modes, there are still 4000 questions available here) - especially if you find it cheap. If however, the price difference between the WiiWare version and this one are too much for you, then we'd stick with the downloadable one for the time being, since most of the experience is the same anyway.

Final Score

24/30

Very Good

Gameplay 8

As enjoyable as ever, with all the different ideas fitting together quite well

Presentation 8

It's a quiz, so it doesn't need to look really good - but either way, the graphics are improved over the original and do their job

Enjoyment 4

Very enjoyable with friends, when on your own though, it can be a bit of a bore